California’s Identity Support Plans Erode Parents’ Rights

California’s Santa Ana Unified School District (SAUSD), like many districts across the state, offers a confidential arrangement known as an Identity Support Plan for transgender and gender-nonconforming students. Under this policy, staff are required to affirm a student’s stated gender identity in all aspects of school life — including names, pronouns, use of facilities, and records privacy. The plan explicitly allows students to exclude their parents from being notified or involved if the student chooses. Although the policy’s stated goal is to promote equity and safety for LGBTQ+ students — a goal many support — it also means parents may remain completely unaware of major developments in their children’s identities and experiences at school.

The critical issue, according to SAUSD board member Brenda Lebsack, lies with the district’s policy language, which states: “school personnel should not discuss information that may disclose a student’s gender nonconforming status to others, including parents/legal guardians … unless the student has authorized such disclosure.” This means that children may, with staff support, adopt a new name or pronouns or otherwise assert a new gender identity, and school staff are expressly prohibited from informing parents without the child’s consent. Lebsack has raised the alarm that this effectively redefines the parent-school relationship and makes school staff — not parents — the ultimate gatekeepers for life-changing information about a child’s identity.

Legal counsel, which recently presented to the board, asserted that the IDSP’s confidentiality is about student protection and alignment with California’s anti-discrimination laws. But Lebsack strongly objects, arguing that the policy is based on the assumption that informing parents is inherently risky or harmful. “Why is the assumption that parents are untrustworthy or dangerous?” she asked legal counsel, highlighting that the default should be to involve parents unless there is compelling evidence of harm.

Lebsack correctly pointed out that the policy’s actual language directly contradicts the public reassurances from legal counsel and district officials that “nothing is being hidden from parents.” This disconnect, Lebsack notes, undermines trust and transparency — cornerstones of the educational partnership between families and schools.

Adding to the controversy, SAUSD’s policy includes no age thresholds. Despite legal counsel referencing age twelve as a minimum to be on an IDSP, neither local board policy nor state guidance establishes any minimum age for the initiation of an IDSP. Consequently, children at any grade level, potentially lacking emotional maturity or full understanding, can be coached through major decisions without their family’s awareness.

Lebsack notes recent public records requests reveal that parental exclusion is not a rare occurrence, but well within the mainstream of current practice. In the 2023–24 year, Fullerton Joint Union reported 106 students on IDSPs, with parental notification in only two cases. Similar numbers have arisen in districts like Los Alamitos (58), Tustin Unified (180), and San Diego Unified (over 800), while some large districts refused to provide data altogether. This systemic pattern belies assurances that parents are typically involved—and raises serious questions about widespread implementation of the policy.

Concerns extend acutely to families of special education students. Despite legal counsel’s claims to the contrary, Lebsack asserts that direct evidence exists of special needs students undergoing “gender-affirming” counseling without parental knowledge. She cites the case of a cognitively delayed teenager whose gender identity was affirmatively counseled by school staff without involving his highly engaged parents. The family, confident that procedural safeguards protected them, discovered only later that exceptions had been invoked. —after the fact, and too late to be meaningfully involved.

The debate does not stop at pronouns or names. The curriculum recommended by both the California Department of Education (CDE) and the California Teachers Association (CTA) introduces students to concepts of puberty blockers and gender transition medications, framing them as “cures” for gender confusion. This is deeply concerning to many parents and experts, especially since the British government has now banned puberty blockers for minors. The CTA’s own policy advocates for access to puberty blockers and hormone therapy for children “with or without parent knowledge or consent.”

Lebsack argues that such policies foreshadow where the system is headed, as school materials are increasingly rooted in the ideology of unlimited gender fluidity, a concept that she notes is not universally accepted and is often presented to children as fact rather than as one viewpoint in an ongoing debate. The risks of confusion and regret, she argues, are especially of concern for young, impressionable children who trust authority figures.

The remedy, according to Lebsack, lies in reinstating parental notification as the universal standard, except in clear cases of documented, immediate danger. She advocates for fully transparent, standardized processes, guaranteed parental engagement, and evidence-based — not ideologically driven — education. Furthermore, Lebsack believes IDSPs have no place in public education at all. She maintains that trust in public schools depends on their role as true partners to families, not as substitutes for parental authority.

Without honest discussion and a willingness to revisit the assumptions undergirding these policies, Lebsack worries that trust in the public education system will further erode — and the children at the center of the debate may face unintended, and sometimes irreversible, consequences. An often-said phrase is that as California goes, so goes the nation. Such policies should not be repeated by other states and should be retracted in California.

Editor’s note: This article was first published by The American Spectator.